


Sleepless in Starling City

by AsarInrahe



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-25
Updated: 2014-07-25
Packaged: 2018-02-10 10:01:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2020848
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AsarInrahe/pseuds/AsarInrahe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Both Felicity and Oliver are having nightmares.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sleepless in Starling City

**Author's Note:**

> I can't remember when I wrote this, but just found it in a note book and typed it. It's probably the first Olicity fic I ever wrote!

The dream is deep. She is swirling somewhere in suffocating pressure. She is underwater, at the bottom of the ocean and she has only the one breath of air in her lungs. She wishes she had the courage to open her mouth and draw the water into her lungs, to end all this. She wants to squeeze her eyes shut, but they stay peeled open. She feels a slight tickle on her shoulder, like the brush of some long, thin insect legs. She turns her head and sees the clawlike nails creep over her shoulder to her collarbone. They sprout from grey decayed fingers. Two claws dig into her skin and taint the water around with red curls. The Count steps around her and raises one claw to her face, trailing the needlesharp nail from the top of her cheekbone to her chin. The pain wakes her up. Even though she has started to use gloves while she sleeps, she has once again succeeded in digging her nails into her skin to draw blood.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

He was afraid of sleeping for so long. It was strange because he considered himself fairly coolheaded. Only after the earthquake the dreams had started to plague him. So many times during the day something someone said or did had brought him back to the island. To the worst times on the island. But not at night. Now every time he closed his eyes he was back on the island. And the dreams were more torturous than reality because they mixed the past with the present. He dreamed of putting an arrow into Fyers, only to realise that it had been Felicity he shot. He dreamed of lying in a pool of blood on the floor of the cage in the freighter and digging a bullet out of his side, only to hand it to Diggle who took it to Felicity to analyze. He tried to get up from the floor and reach for her. If he only could touch her, just with the tip of his finger, he would be safe. She would always disappear into the darkness.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

When he gets to the foundry, the whole place is pitch black. He doesn't know what he is going to do, train, loose himself in research online, collapse on the floor and lie there until the pain recedes. It's different than physical pain, this wracking agony that he feels sometimes. It is rare for him to not be able to shake it off quicker. He has almost decided to choose option number three, when in the pale light of the fire exit he sees the form curled against the wall.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

She doesn't hear him enter. She is too lost, too tired. She doesn't move as he sits down next to her. The smell of him, the feel of his arm around her shoulders, the warmth of his body. She feels safe.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

He opens his eyes to the light of day streaming through the only small window of smoked glass high up on the back wall. The day must be half through already. He has slept on the floor of the foundry, first almost sitting up, until slowly sliding to the floor. Something warms his side and some furry animal has made its nest on his neck and chin. He uses his free arm to peel away the blond hair that has strayed into his mouth. Her head is cutting off most of the circlulation to his other arm, but he can feel through the tingling the fingers curled around his own. The fingers that kept him safe from and in his dreams that night.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

She opens her eyes at the same moment she wakes. There is something pink against his face that is moving slightly. She realizes it's his arm. If she were herself at that precise moment, she would jump up and babble herself out of the situation. But she is far too relaxed and doesn't want to move a muscle. Until she realizes his hand has probably gone numb. She raises her head and moves it onto his chest. He flexes the muscles in his arm, but doesn't let go of her fingers.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

-You know, I'm actually really cold, he says after a while. -Never thought to install warming to the floors. Hold on a sec.

                             He reaches somewhere beyond him and rolls open a training mat. Somehow he maneuvers to move it beneath them.

                             -I can probably reach the blanket. She does, and he wraps it around both of them.

                             His heartbeat is slow and steady until she turns her head to look up at him.

                             -What happened to your cheek?

                             -Bad dreams.

                             -Me too.

                             They seem to lapse back into silence after that. After a while she can feel his body temperature returning to normal. Time seems to stretch and disappear until the pattern of their breath is almost hypnotic.

                                                          *                                                       *                                                       *

When he starts to speak, it is as if a continuation of his dreams. She is lulled by the soft earthquake of his voice rumbling in his chest under her cheek. He doesn't know how long he talks, but he tells her everything. And as tears tickle down the side of his face, she reaches her fingers to catch them. And after he has told her everything, she searches his gaze and wraps her arms around him and holds him as the pressure in his chest slowly unravels. And finally, after his body has stopped shaking, and they have stared each other in the gathering darkness, they reach for each other at the same time, and he lets go of rest of the fear and anger he has gathered inside of him in the last six years.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!


End file.
